“Really?” was his first reaction. Then he continued. “There’s really not much to say. I’m not going to go to the media and do any talking. I’ll do my talking on the ice.”

Now there’s some swagger. Why not just toss in a, “Dude, scoreboard” while you’re at it. It’s earned at this point given how Couture has played this series.

Thornton, to his credit, wrote off Bieksa’s comments as being “just talk” and cited their dire position in the series as his reason for sounding off. The Sharks, meanwhile, are looking for their first sweep in franchise history and can finish off the Canucks tomorrow night.

Cant believe how much the canucks are off their games this series. Sorry vancouver fans, but your time has passed, and Gillis isn’t doing anything to change the direction. With the sedins declining production and the lack of prospects the canucks will be the new flames in five years. Schneider and Kesler will be enough to get them to about 10th place every year, and they won’t attempt to start a rebuild till its too late.

Vancouver doesn’t have the horses to win right now, that’s obvious, and they’re not gonna lose this series because of officiating … but it’s hard to deny the officiating has been absolutely atrocious in this series. Again, they’re not losing because officiating but how in the world do you call that slash to give SJ a 90 second 5 on 3…

OK, so officials have clearly been sensitive towards a few players on Vancouver because of a few players have a history of embellishment, (not to mention Burrows calling out Auger…but I won’t go there) not acknowledge that said players have actually changed the way they play the game, and then actually impute the same behavior onto the whole team …we’ve become accustomed to that. It is another thing all together to completely ignore actual diving from one team and seemingly call anything and everything that even looks like a penalty from the other.

No sour grapes, SJ looks as good as we’ve all expected them to for a long time and I hope they make some noise beyond this series.

All I can hope for is if this is actually is the end of this era … hopefully the (largely undeserved) reputation goes with it. **looking at moronic comment below

matt14gg - May 7, 2013 at 8:13 AM

I love that the Canucks gutless style of play is now coming back to haunt them. Bad officiating? Better believe it. You think refs don’t get tired of being made to look bad? This is years of the Canucks “brand” of hockey now being played against them and they and their fans don’t like it. Same thing is happening to the Canadiens and hopefully the trend in the NHL is to move away from the diving and faking and cheap shots that these two teams have used as a tactic to win games. So enjoy, Canucks fans, because you definitely deserve it.

loinstache - May 6, 2013 at 9:50 PM

During the off-season, Bieksa and several other players form an initiative to increase awareness of embellishment in hockey. It is seen as both welcome and humorous, as Bieksa’s team, the Vancouver Canucks, are known as among the most notoriously guilty divers in the league. Nevertheless people are pleased that the effort was made to quell a trend hated by everyone in hockey, and assume Bieksa is acknowledging his team’s fault.

Flash forward to the play-offs of the following year; the Canucks have greatly diminished their theatrics over the year. During a match-up against the San Jose Sharks, two of San Jose’s players are called out for embellishing by Bieksa. Any truth in the statement is largely ignored as people claim that Vancouver’s past makes their complaints invalid.

Several weeks later in the play-offs, X player is caught embellishing and fans everywhere moan of a lack of effort to reduce diving.

I agree I am biased against the ‘ucks. I lost much respect for them as a team in 2 years ago. During the finals, their play on the ice and mouths off showed their character. I never would have guessed I would have so quickly come to despise a team I once cheered for.